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What We Talk About When We Talk About Gentrification

Posted: August 16, 2017

Hamilton is changing. If you live in Hamilton, you’re surely aware of it. If you’re not from Hamilton, then you’ve almost definitely read stories about the city’s “renaissance”—a myriad of new developments, successful local businesses, its bustling arts community, and its rising popularity among Torontonians who are just thrilled to declare Hamilton as the GTA’s new hotspot.

What many people remain unaware of, however, is that the changes we see throughout the city are a direct result of gentrification in Hamilton’s downtown core. Gentrification is a term that encompasses the changes that occur when high-income communities push out long-term residents of a low-income area for their personal gain. It is a force that perpetuates a cycle of continuously displacing marginalized communities, who are often working class, racialized, LGBTQIA+, and/or indigenous.